ICMR to host global web conference on science, ethics of COVID-19 vaccine starting 4.30 pm today

The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has planned to host an online, multi-country symposium on ‘Novel Ideas in Science and Ethics of Vaccines Against Covid-19 Pandemic’ on 30 July. The web symposium will see leading medical experts and scientists as speakers and panellists on different themes in the science and ethics around a vaccine for the coronavirus pandemic. The event would be conducted from 4.30 pm to 6.45 pm today, and livestreamed on ICMR’s website. [caption id=“attachment_8630191” align=“alignnone” width=“1280”] A vaccination against the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) from German biotechnology company CureVac is administered to a volunteer at the start of a clinical test series at a university clinic in Tuebingen, Germany. Reuters[/caption] The first session by Dr Anthony S Fauci, Director, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, USA is a talk on ‘Confronting the pandemic’. This will be followed by remarks from experts on ‘Timely & Safe – Towards a Covid-19 vaccine - Role of vaccines in ending epidemics’. Two panel discussions on ‘Novel Ideas in Vaccine Development, rollout, and adopting emerging evidence in pandemic situations’, and ‘Ethics of different development approaches, equity of participation in development & community engagement’ are expected to follow, where many world-leading experts are expected to share their views. The 25+ speakers at the symposium include Prof (Dr) Balram Bhargava, Director General of ICMR; Prof Nir Eyal, Director, Center for Population-level Bioethics (CPLB) at Rutgers School of Public Health; Prof (Dr) Randeep Guleria, Director of AIIMS, New Delhi; Prof Adrian Hill, Director, Jenner Institute & Professor of Human Genetics at the University of Oxford; Prof Adam Kamradt-Scott, Director, Global Health Security Network; Prof Gagandeep Kang, Director, Translational Health Science & Technology Institute; Prof Heidi Larson, Director of the Vaccine Confidence Project (VCP) and Professor, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, among several others. Find the detailed agenda for the symposium  here.